CAPUTO: Calm is the word as Jeff Tungate picks up the pieces of Oakland's women's basketball program

He’s been an NCAA Division II head coach in Harrogate, Tennessee. He’s been an NCAA Division I assistant in Fort Wayne, Indiana.

He’s coached locally, as an assistant, at Oakland Community College, Rochester College and Oakland University, where Tungate is in his first season as the women’s head basketball coach.

It is Tungate, who is in charge of picking up the pieces in the aftermath of the sudden and surprising dismissal of OU’s previous coach, Beckie Francis.

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As winding as the road has been to his current position, and as much as being in his present spot would have been unforeseen right up until the sudden departure of Francis, Tungate always returns to his roots for guidance. He was raised in Clarkston. His father, Paul Tungate, now retired, was the former Clarkston High School baseball coach and athletic director.

He is the base for what Tungate is as a coach.

Paul Tungate, behind future National League Rookie of the Year and World Series hero, the late Steve Howe, coached Clarkston to the Class A state baseball title in 1976. Father and son have the same demeanor and style.

Calm. Organized. Controlled. Together.

In other words, just what the OU women’s basketball team needs right now.

Tungate had been OU men’s coach Greg Kampe’s associate head coach for several years when Francis was abruptly dismissed, almost in unison with the resignation of her husband, Gary Russi, the longtime university president. Francis reportedly was dismissed because she was mentally and emotionally abusing players, charges Francis has vehemently denied.

The announcement of Tungate to replace Francis received little fanfare. He was initially hired as interim coach. The interim label was removed shortly before the season began.

“We couldn’t have been more impressed with how Jeff immediately organized the program and pulled it together,” Oakland athletic director Tracy Huth said. “We were going to have it be interim, and conduct a widespread search, but saw the coach we needed at this time. It was a sacrifice for Greg Kampe and the men’s team, but it was for the betterment of the athletic program overall.”

There is great difficulty inherent in Tungate’s task given the circumstances which caused the coaching change. Tungate, 44, did have experience coaching women’s basketball before, but only one year as an assistant under former OU star Ann Serra at OCC. He had been a head coach before, for five years in his late 20s and early 30s at Lincoln Memorial University in Tennessee.

“It was a low profile job in which I was able to learn and grow and make my share of mistakes, from which I learned a great deal,” Tungate said

He sees no difference between coaching men’s and women’s basketball.

“To me, coaching isn’t about men or women, but people and basketball players,” Tungate said. “When Tracy Huth asked me if I would be interested in this position and offered it to me, it took me virtually no time for me to accept.

“I wanted a Division I head coaching job. Men or women – it didn’t make any difference to me.”

The lessons Tungate learned from his father are being applied. He was the bat boy for the state championship Clarkston team.

“What I learned from my father, and being around him while he coached for several years, and when he was the AD, is how to treat people and the right way to lead,” Tungate said. “He did it the right way - always.”

Tungate starred for Oakland’s baseball team as a left-handed pitcher, but basketball is his first love. Dan Fife, who has built Clarkston’s basketball program into one of the best in the state, inspired Tungate to become a basketball coach. He also attended former Clarkston High, University of Michigan star and long-time NBA player Tim McCormick’s basketball camp while in high school.

“I was a better baseball player than I was basketball player, but liked basketball better,” Tungate said. “So I played baseball for as long as I could, but turned to basketball to coach. Playing for Dan Fife wasn’t easy. He was demanding, but I appreciated him so much. When I went to Tim McCormick’s basketball camp, I knew pretty much from that point on that I wanted to be a basketball coach.

“That decision was made in my mind when I was in 10th grade at Clarkston High School.”

Paul Tungate said he never pushed his son in one direction or another.

“I wouldn’t do that, and even if I wanted to, I didn’t have to. Jeff loved sports from the time he was a small kid,” Paul Tungate said. “But I think he really lit up playing for Dan Fife. It inspired him. He has really wanted to do well and do it right.

“He’s my son, and I’m not saying this just because I’m his dad, but I can honestly say I’ve never met anybody who works harder more consistently than Jeff. He has a great work ethic, and that’s a credit to him, not me or Dan or anybody else.”

Oh yeah. There’s the team.

“It’s the most important thing,” Tungate said.

When Tungate took over the program, it was alarmingly low on available players, not only because of transfers, but players still recovering from serious injuries. He only had nine players, and couldn’t even hold full-court scrimmages with only OU’s players, during preseason practice.

Oakland has a solid nucleus, though, most notably Olivia Nash, Kim Bee, Elena Popkey and Bethany Watterworth, the latter who led Lake Orion to the Class A semifinals while in high school.

Oakland is 2-2 in the Horizon League, including a victory over Detroit Mercy. It is 7-10 overall, trailing by just a point at halftime at Michigan State, and by only seven at intermission at Tennessee, which was ranked No. 2 nationally at the time.

“The transfers were completed by the time I was named to this position,” Tungate said. “The players who stayed were very upbeat and ready to compete from the beginning. I’m proud of how hard they have played and worked together as a team.

“I have no control over what happened in the past. I can only move our program forward from where I got it. To me this is a great opportunity.”

About the Author

Pat Caputo has written as a beat writer and sports columnist for The Oakland Press since 1984 and blogs at http://patcaputo.blogspot.com/. Reach the author at pat.caputo@oakpress.com
or follow Pat on Twitter: @PatCaputo98.